The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1887-08-10
REV. DR.. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINE'S sun
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "Preachins, Teaching and
ExhortatiOn."


ExhortatiOn."
TEXT: Or ministry, let US 1cdit on our
.niniStering; or he that tedcheth, on teach.
ing or he that erhorteth, on erhortation." "
Romans, xii, rs.
Before the world is converted the style Of
religious discourse will have to be converted.
You might as well go into the modern Sedan
or gettysburg with bows and arrows instead
of rifles and bombshells and sparks of artil-
lsry, as to expect to conquer this world for
God by the old styles Of exhortation and SER
.nonolgy. Jonathan Edwards preached the
sermons most adapted to the age IN whleh ne
lived, but If those sermons were preached now
they would divide an audience into two
classes, those sound asleep and those wanting
Bnt there is religious discourse of the
future-who will preach it have no idea; IN
what part of the earth it will be born have
40 idea; in which denominations OF Christians
it win be delivered cannot guess. That
discourse or e1hortation may be born III the
country meeting house on the banks OF the
St. Lawrence, or the Oregon, or the Ohio, or
the Tombigbee, or the Alabama The per
con who shall deliver it may this moment be
in cradle under the shadow Of the Sierra
Neyadas, or in a New England farmhouse,
or amid the rice-felds of Southern Savannas.
Or this moment there may be some young man
in some of our theological semnaries in the
Junior or middle or senior class, shaping that
weapon of power. Or there may be coming
some new baptism of the Holy Ghost on the
churches, so thatsome Of us who now stand
in the watch-towers of Zion, waking to
realization of our present inefficency, may
preach it ourselves. That coming discourse
NAV not be fifty years off. And let us pray
God that its arrival may be hastened, while
announce to you what l think will be the
chief characteristics of that discourse or ex-
.hortation when it does arrive, and l want to
ate and suggestive to all classes OF Christian
workers
First of all remark, that that future re-
igious discourse will be full of living
Christ in contradistinction to didactic techni-
calities. A discourse may be full of Christ
sermon may be empty Of Christ while every
sentence is repititious of His titles. The
world wants living Christ, not Christ
standing at the head Of a formal system of
theology, but a Christ who means pardon and
sympathy, and coincidence, and brotherhood,
and life, and heaven. A poor mans Christ.
A rich mans Christ. An overworked mans
Christ. An invalid's Christ. A farmers
Christ. A merchants Christ. An artisans
Christ. An every mans Christ.
A symmetrical and fne-worded system or
theology. is well enough for theological
.classes, but it has no more business in pull
pit than have the technical phrases Of an
aanatomist or Psychologist or physician IN
the sick room Of patient The world wants
help, immediate and world-uplifting, and it
viii come through discourse in which
Christ shall walk right down into the immor-
fal soul and take everlasting possession OF it,
filing it as full Of light as is this monday
Ornament. -.
That sermon or exhortation of the future
-s in fhrpa6-
bare illustrations Of Jesus Christ In that
coming address there will be instances OF
vicarious suffering taken right out Of every
day life, for there is not day somebody Is
not dying for others. As the physician saw
ing his dfphtheritic patient by sacrificing his
own life; as the ship captain going. down
With his vessel She ,ha he is getting his bis pas
man consuming in the burning building
while he is taking a child out
of. q fourth-story window: as in summer
the strong swimmer at East Hampton, or
Long Branch, or Cape May, or Lake George,
himself perished trying to rescue the drown
ing; as the newspaper boy one summer, sup
porting his mother foy some years, his invalid
cents to get some especial paper, and he got
it, and rushed up in his anxiety to deliver it,
and was crushed under the wheels Of the
train, and lay on the grass with only strength
:, enough to say: "Oh, what will become of my
poor sick mother now"
Vicarious suffering. The world is full Of it.
An engineer said to me on locomotive in
Dakota ave men seem to be coming to
better appreciation than we used to. Did
you see that account the other day Of an
engineer who, to save his passengers, stuck to
his place, and when he was found dead in the
locomotive, which was upside down, he was
found still smiling, his hand on the air,brake"
And as the engineer said it to me, he put his
hand on the air-brake to illustrate his mean
ing, and looked at him and thought "You
would be just as much Of hero in the same
crisis
Oh, in that religious discourse Of the future
there will be living illustrations taken out
from everyday life Of vcarious suffering
illustrations that will bring to mind The
ghastGer sacrifice Of Him who in the high
places Of the field, on the cross, fought our
battles, and wept our griefs. and endured our
struggle, and died our death.
A. German sculptor made an image Of
Christ and he asked his little child two years
old who It was, and she said: THAT must be
some great man." The sculptor was dis
pleased with the criticism, so he got
away on it two or three years, and then he
brought in his little child four or five years Of
age, and he said to her: Who do you think
that isF' she said: That must be the One who
took little children in his arms and blessed
Them" Then the sculptor was satisfied Oh.
my friends, what the world wants is not
cold Christ, not an intellectual Christ, not
severely magisterial Christ, but loving
Christ, spreading out His arms Of sympathy
to press the whole world to His loving heart.
90 But, remark again, Chat the religious dis
course of the future will be short. Condensa-
tion is demanded by the age in which we live.
No more need Of long introductions and long
applications, and so many divisions to dis
course that it may be said to be hydra-headed.
In other days men got all their information
from the pulpit There were few books and
there were no newspapers, and there was lit
tie travel from place to place, and people
would sit and listen two and a half
hours to a religious discourse, and
'tseventeenthly" would find them fresh
and clipper. In those days there was
enough time for q man to take an hour to
warm himself up to the subject and an hour
to cool of, But what was necessity then
is superfuity now. Congregations are full
of knowledge from books, from newspapers,
from rapid and continuous intercommunica-
tion, and long disquisitions of what they
know already will not be abided. IT relig-
ious teacher cannot compress what he wishes
to say to the people in the space Of forty five
minntes, better adjourn it to some other day.
The trouble is we preach audiences into q
Christian frame, and then we preach them
out Of it. We forget that every auditor has
50 much capacity of attention, and when that
is exhausted be is restless. That accident on
the Long Island Railroad souie years ago
came from the fact that the brakes were out
- nN,I 70 cfN